Publications: ExchangeMonitor Morning Briefing

Two of the Senate’s reliable nuclear skeptics last week asked the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to investigate the budget increase the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) is seeking for the 2021 fiscal year. Among other things, the pair want the GAO to determine why the semiautonomous Department of Energy agency’s Weapons Activities budget needs a […]

In light of the nation’s focus on high-end threats and near-peer adversaries following release of the 2018 National Defense Strategy (NDS), the Air Force is taking a new look at its requirements, including the number of B-21 stealth bombers it will need, according to service officials. Will Roper, the Air Force’s head of acquisition and […]

An Energy Department working group is still grappling with recommended changes on management of the payments in lieu of taxes (PILT) program for communities around nuclear facilities, Energy Secretary Dan Brouillette said Thursday. During a hearing of the House Appropriations energy and water subcommittee, the secretary promised to personally brief Rep. Mike Simpson (R-Idaho) on […]

The House Armed Services Committee on Wednesday began to ink the contours of the 2021 nuclear weapons budget fight to come, when the panel’s chair wondered why the White House wants to give the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) a $2.5 billion raise with the agency sitting on $8 billion in unspent appropriations. The White […]

Operations at the Moab Uranium Mill Tailings Remedial Action (UMTRA) project in Utah resumed within just a few days earlier this month after a truck overturned while carrying a load of waste, an Energy Department spokesperson confirmed Tuesday. A truck carrying a container of uranium mill tailings rolled onto its side while rounding a corner […]

A former head of the prime contractor for the Energy Department’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico, Philip Breidenbach, will lead the vendor team in charge of managing liquid waste at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina. Amentum, the successor to AECOM’s government contracting branch, announced Thursday that Breidenbach will replace Tom […]

Jeff Griffin, the associate principal deputy assistant secretary for field operations at the Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management, is leaving to take a post with the Canadian Nuclear Laboratories in Chalk River, Ontario. Griffin’s departure, effective March 11, was announced in an email sent to staff members Tuesday from Environmental Management Principal Deputy Assistant […]

US Ecology posted net income of $33.1 million on $685.5 million in revenue for 2019. That translated to income of $1.40 per diluted share, the Boise, Idaho-based waste management provider said Wednesday in its latest earnings report. By comparison for 2018, the corporation tallied $49.6 million in net income on revenue of $565.9 million. US Ecology’s Environmental […]

The Department of Energy wants $20 million in fiscal 2021 for operations to lay the groundwork for the eventual consolidation and temporary storage of nuclear waste now dispersed around the nation. That is the largest slice of the $27.5 million requested for Interim Storage and Nuclear Waste Fund Oversight in the budget year beginning Oct. […]

The Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina enacted an emergency response Tuesday morning when a vehicle attempting to enter a secure area activated explosive detection systems. Site barricades remained open through the duration of the emergency response and there was “no indication of a consequence beyond the Savannah River Site boundaries,” according […]

While BWX Technologies lost out on a multibillion-dollar remediation contract at the Hanford Site in Washington state, President and CEO Rex Geveden said Tuesday he is optimistic about a “robust” pipeline of potential Energy Department projects. “Unfortunately, we were not awarded the Hanford Central Plateau Cleanup contract,” Geveden said during the Lynchburg, Va.-based company’s quarterly […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) said Tuesday it plans to soon start work on a South Carolina plutonium disposal project — operations that will consume about one-third of the amount Congress appropriated for the project in the current 2020 federal budget year. This site preparation work for the Surplus Plutonium Disposition project at the […]

Amentum, the Maryland-based successor to AECOM’s Management Services branch, on Wednesday named longtime industry manager Tom Foster as chief operating officer of its Nuclear & Environment business unit. Foster has more than 35 years of experience in the nuclear industry, from decommissioning to operations, according to a company press release. Most recently, he was president […]

The Navy’s only manufacturer of nuclear reactors, BWX Technologies, said Tuesday that the service’s plans to procure just one Virginia-class attack submarine in fiscal 2021 could hit the company’s bottom line. BWXT President and CEO Rex Geveden said in the quarterly earnings call with analysts that while there is a “long way to go on getting […]

Northrop Grumman tapped Bechtel National and Kratos Defense & Security Solutions to provide construction services and specialized transportation equipment for the Ground-Based Strategic Deterrent (GBSD) intercontinental ballistic missile production program the aerospace giant hopes to win this summer. Northrop Grumman is the only bidder for the estimated $25 billion engineering and manufacturing development contract to […]

The Department of Energy is seeking comments on plans to use grout to shore up a trio of underground waste structures in danger of collapse at the Hanford Site in Washington state. In a notice Tuesday, DOE said the comment period is between March 23 and April 24 on its plans for the facilities located […]

The Energy Department is accepting resumes for the job of managing the Hanford Site in Washington state, a post currently held by Brian Vance. The agency on Tuesday formally invited expressions of interest for the job of overseeing both the Richland Operations Office and Office of River Protection (ORP) at Hanford, the sprawling complex that […]

Nuclear remediation sites overseen by the Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management would receive another small bump in funding for safeguards and security in fiscal 2021, according to budget tables released by the Donald Trump administration early Monday. The proposal for $321 million in the budget year beginning Oct. 1 is a step up from […]

Funds for the Department of Energy’s planned program for interim storage of nuclear waste in the upcoming budget would be focused on headquarters operations in Washington, D.C., with smaller amounts distributed to Idaho and Nevada, according to figures released Monday. The Energy Department on Feb. 10 requested $27.5 million for an Interim Storage and Nuclear […]

In a housecleaning move to continue wrapping up legal issues surrounding the terminated plutonium recycling plant at the Savannah River Site, a federal judge in South Carolina last week officially dismissed a 2018 state lawsuit against the Department of Energy. In the two-page decision filed on Feb. 20, District Judge J. Michelle Childs wrote that […]

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) seeks nearly a fourfold funding increase for development of the W87-, silo-based intercontinental ballistic-missile warhead in fiscal 2021, plus more than $1 billion to help build the plutonium cores for that warhead, according to new budget details released Monday. The budget proposal from the semiautonomous Department of Energy nuclear […]

Energy Department contractor BWX Technologies took in $501 million of revenue during the fourth quarter of 2019, a 5% uptick over $478 million a year earlier. In addition, the Lynchburg, Va.-based company reported late Monday that revenue of nearly $1.9 billion for the 12 months ended Dec. 31 set a new record and represented a […]

Complications with the B61-12 and W88 Alt-370 programs might delay production of new intercontinental ballistic missile fuzes at the Kansas City National Security Campus by more than a year, Pentagon budget documents show. The Air Force will need 10 months longer than expected, 41 months total, to purchase long-lead parts for the the ICBM Fuze […]

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on Friday began compiling a list of potential vendors for an upcoming contract worth up to $50 million for design, planning, and construction management for environmental remediation of the Niagara Falls Storage Site (NFSS) in Lewiston, N.Y. The eventual cleanup job will be carried out under the Army Corps’ […]

The Department of Energy on Monday said it would “leverage past experience” and apply best practices to make remediation of 16 nuclear sites more cost-effective in upcoming fiscal year. The language is found in the introduction to the detailed 415-page report for the $6.1 billion budget proposed for the Office of Environmental Management in fiscal […]

The Energy Department said Friday it intends to extend its contractual arrangements for decommissioning of the Portsmouth Site in Ohio with vendor Fluor-BWXT by up to two years. The DOE Office of Environmental Management intends to negotiate a sole-source 12-month extension with two six-month options, according to a notice posted Friday on a federal procurement […]